Be Drunk by Charles Baudelaire


You have to be always drunk. That’s all there is 
to it — it’s the only way. So as not to feel the 
horrible burden of time that breaks your back 
and bends you to the earth, you have to be 
continually drunk.

But on what? Wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish. 
But be drunk.

And if sometimes, on the steps of a palace or the 
green grass of a ditch, in the mournful solitude of 
your room, you wake again, drunkenness already 
diminishing or gone, ask the wind, the wave, 
the star, the bird, the clock, everything that is flying, 
everything that is groaning, everything that is rolling, 
everything that is singing, everything that is speaking 
. . . ask what time it is and wind, wave, star, bird, 
clock will answer you: “It is time to be drunk! 
So as not to be the martyred slaves of time, 
be drunk, be continually drunk! 

On wine, on poetry or on virtue as you wish.”